From little acorns big trees grow - Part 2 -- P.S.

I said I couldn't understand why so many shrubs had been ripped out when a yard wide path was 'surfaced' on the old walkway which runs parallel to Park Lane.

I do now.

Yet another of the man-made plaited fences, of which Sandwell seem to have some sort of fetish, is being installed in the 'Country Park'.

So the one-time country-like lane now has the Park Lane traffic and a plaited fence on one side and a barbed wire topped fence on the other!!

I wonder which country Sandwell has as its model for the Sandwell Valley Country Park.

Afghanistan?

The last 2 photos are of a gate from Park Lane into the Valley.

It used to be a wooden gate, in harmony with its surroundings, until Sandwell decided to replace it with a brashly painted yellow and green metal one, and for some reason, known only to the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat, a height restiriction beam was installed at the same time. The mind boggles at what the rationale could possibly be for installing a height restriction beam at the entrance to a few hundred acres of fields, but that's Sandwell for you. They don't do things by halves.

Anyway, to facilitate the smooth entrance to and egress from the site of plant concerned with the path creation/surfacing, it was deemed necessary to remove the height restriction beam which was placed on the ground, in tacta, to one side of the gateway, presumably awaiting re-erection when the works were finished.

Oh no!

The works have been finished, apparently, but the height restriction beam has not been re-erected.

It still lies on the ground.

But Lo! A new height restriction beam has been installed in it's stead.

This one has a removable top.

Maybe some forward-thinking member of the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat is allowing for the possibility that at some stage in the future it may be desirable that another vehicle of some size be admitted to the site at that point. The forward thinker may have gone on to reason that, in such a circumstance, it would be less costly and more convenient to have a removable top rather than to have to dig the whole thing up and replace it for a third time.

As an alternative to all of this Sandwell rumination, I would have proposed, if asked, that, as the height restriction beam served no useful purpose, the cost of a second installation could have been avoided completely.

But this is Sandwell and they don't do things by halves.

Having wasted somebody's money on the first erection, Sandwell seem perfectly at ease with themselves in wasting some more money the second time round.

But 'Ah!' the forward thinker may have said. 'You have not understood why the beam was erected in the first place. And, to be fair, there's no reason why you should. We in the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat have been specially selected for our wide experience in all things defensive.'

Suddenly I feel humbled.

'But,' the forward thinker may have continued,'we are always happy to share our expertise with ordinary people and I can tell you that the primary reason for the height restriction beam was to prevent unauthorised access by, shall we say, caravans or tarmac trucks or such like. You get my drift??'.

Indeed I would have got his drift.

But I still wouldn't have understood the logic, because there are no height restriction beams at the Salter's Lane entrance to the site (as evidenced by the Pat Collins fair which rolls in each year) and from there, there is access, via the 2 motorway bridges to almost everywhere on the site.

QED

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From little acorns big trees grow - Part 2

I can't believe it's been 11 weeks since my last contribution here.

But there has been Christmas in between so that must have accounted for at least 6 of them.

I thought an update was due on the Acorns matter and the seemingly unnecessary destruction of trees, and the attendant expense, by Swan Pool.

Of course, I had hopelessly misjudged the Sandwell experts and should have realised that they would have had at least one compelling and expert reason why these trees should be hacked away or completely removed.

For this I apologise, and seek to put the record straight immediately.

Round Swan Pool runs a pathway, made by feet over many generations.

A few years ago, in fact, quite a few years ago, there were some 24 hour cycle races, part of the route of which was this path.

It always had had it's ups and downs but the cycle races exacerbated them significantly and rendered a couple of places virtually impassable after periods of wet weather.

And so it has been for, well, quite a few years - must be at least 10.

That is until now - or rather last November.

It was then that Sandwell put in hand the 'fixing' of this path.

Quite why Sandwell's experts waited until mid-November to start such works is, perhaps, something that should not be enquired into by ordinary people, as there is doubtless at least one compelling and expert reason why it should have been so. But November is usually part of the wet UK winter season - last year it was snowy and icy as well for 3 weeks.

Anyway, that aside, if the Sandwell experts want to dig up earthen paths in the middle of Winter, when one can more or less count on them turning into quagmires, rather than in the Summer, when there is at least a chance that they won't, then that is up to the expert Sandwell mind to determine.

The result of these soggy Sandwell labours is a rather messy strip of gravelly-type stuff about a yard wide where the foot-trodden path used to be.

Sandwell have, of course, taken the opportunity to chop out a few more trees and dig up ground yards wide either side of this strip in places.

They have also done something similar to part of a somewhat wider path which runs parallel to Park Lane. This has been partly treated to a covering of 'gravel' but largely dug up and had the gorse bushes; blackberries etc removed.

Without the benefit of an expert mind I haven't been able to reason out why only part of the path has been 'processed' but I suppose we should all be grateful that there a still a few blackberry bushes where the Sandwell works have not been carried out.

I also fail to understand why so many of the shrubs have been taken out. I mean, this path being so close to Park Lane has meant that you could always hear the traffic going past. Now you can see it as well, just a few yards away - and Sandwell call this place a 'Country Park'.

Believe me readers, Sandwell Valley has, over the last 10 years or so, become less rural and more urban as each year has passesd.

It bristles man-made intrusions such as warning signs; notice boards; dog waste bins; alarmed lifebelt posts; CCTV cameras; 4 x 4's etc etc. And while the man-made content has been increasing year by year, the number of trees, young and old, have been reducing as also have the hedgerows all of which have been either reduced in height to 4 or 5 feet, or cut down completely. In fact, Sandwell have, since last Autumn, cut down so many trees and so much mature hawthorn hedge that they have resorted to burning it. Even Sandwell's proud fleet of wood chippers apparently couldn't cope with the volume - there were 6 separate sites where the fires were made.

Yes, Sandwell is producing a wonderful 'Country Park' - and it has a Green Flag to prove it!!!!.

However, and this is no more than a thought, not in any way intended to subvert the Sandwell intelligentia, but would not the interests of the Sandwell Council Tax payer be better served by doing away with the chippers and chain saws; the bonfires and sub-contractors, and instead replacing them with a few gallons of napalm.

This would, I guess, be a far cheaper alternative, and one which is no less destructive.

Great idea.

Everyone's a winner.

Oh! Except the layers of management and health and safety people and buyers and councillors and experts and .......

No. This idea's no good after all as it would start nibbling away at the Great Sandwell Job Creation Scheme.

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From little acorns big trees grow - except at Sandwell Valley.

At the end of Swan Pool nearest the boat house there used to be 50 or so 100 year old poplars and sundry other old and (some of them) enormous other kinds of tree. That was until 2008 when Sandwell had them cut down for reasons documented elsewhere in this blog.

Some of the affected trees have defiantly started growing again but, sadly, about 1/3 of the poplars are dead.

Well, last Friday, when in that same vicinity, I heard the sound of chainsaws!

Upon checking, I found a crew of Acorn chaps setting about a willow tree.

I took a quick photo so that I could compare it with the blank space which I fully expected to be the outcome, based on previous Sandwell performance.

Imagine my surprise then when the following day I noticed that the willow was still there, allbeit in much reduced form - decimated is, for once, probably correctly used in this context.

But there was something different which I didn't immediately spot.

And that 'something' was the whole of 2 trees on the other side of the little path. They had just gone - literally rased to the ground. You can see that the tree on the extreme left in the first photo just isn't there in the second.

A crying shame.

These trees were old; out of the way; no trouble to anyone, and were not in the CCTV's line of sight.

Why on Earth do Sandwell pursue such utterly needless destruction?

Why has Sandwell destroyed, and continues to destroy, so much that is good?

Why does Sandwell pay subcontractors to carry out unnecessary work at a time when it should be conserving its resources?

Why does Sandwell exist at all?

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A bit more 're-profiling' at Sandwell

Take a look at the first photo and note the dense hawthorn hedge along the pathway.
This hedge has been trimmed and nurtured for a good 20 years - probably much longer.
Fortunately I had this photo in my archives because without any notice, and by this I mean without the self-congratulatory notices that Sandwell sometimes put up, the hawthorn started to disappear.

Not only that, but also a good number of the trees behind it, and all of the hedge behind those.

The result is the second photo.

No Hedges. Far fewer trees. And another of those plaited fences which Sandwell seem to have a fetish about.

This 're-profiling' started just before a dog show took place close by and as I was walking past, what were then, piles of freshly hewn timber, a lady, who was exhibiting her pooch at the show, arrested me and demanded to know why the trees were being cut down. I said 'Well, it's Sandwell here. That's what they do.'

'But,' she said,' they were cutting down trees last year when we were here.'

'That's right,' I reassured her. 'That's what Sandwell do. It's something they are very good at and they have got a Green Flag for it. Sandwell have cut down hundreds of mature trees in the last few years and, if you include saplings, the number would run into thousands.'

She didn't seem to be very reassured and started telling me that she came from some forest or other where they are planting trees. So I told her that we don't do that sort of thing here. Here, Sandwell already have some forests, they don't need to plant any, so they cut them down instead. It finds something for the rangers to do, and for the green management to manage. It also provides something for the subcontractors to do, and for the Community Pay Back people hack around, and for the Monday volunteers who 'engage' with Sandwell (I think that is the Green Flag requirement) and chop a few smallish trees and hedges down in between coffee breaks.

Somehow, I don't think she'll be back!

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Forge Mill Lake II

Well. It didn't take long.

A couple of days, in fact, was all it took to 're-profile' the north island.

A case of now you see it - now you don't.

What a terrible waste of nature. 25 years in the growing thrown away in 2 days at the whim of Sandwell and the Environment Agency.

And all for some ridiculouly claimed benefit for birds which, I guess, most of Sandwell Council wouldn't recognise if they fell over them.

I say 'claimed' because it just has to be a nonsense. How, one asks oneself, did ground nesting birds, such as lapwings, possibly manage this last umpteen hundred years without Sandwell and the Environment Agency 're-profiling' islands for them?

The answer is 'perfectly well, thank you.'

So who do Sandwell and the Environment Agency think they are kidding?

Well us, appparently. They are certainly no fools themselves. In fact, I think that this is all part of a grand job creation scheme which Sandwell have slipped in over the last 6 or 7 years at Sandwell Valley.

I don't know how Sandwell square this, with their announcement this week that another 1,000 jobs have got to go because they can't afford them.

Maybe Unison, well known for its commitment to lapwings, understands, and can explain in ways which the ordinary man can understand.

And another thing.

The Environment Agency.

Is it somehow related to Sandwell? Or are they just bedfellows of kindred spirit?

I must research this because I am pretty sure that the Environment Agency was implicated in the farcical additional run-off at Sandwell (see my post 14th December, 2009). I didn't photograph the notice that was displayed at that time so I can't prove it. If I am wrong, I apologise in advance - but I think I'm right!

If I am right, then the run-off and the 're-profiled' island would seem to indicate a penchant of Sandwell and the Environment Agency for spending money unnecessarily on daft and environmentally damaging projects.

Come on Mr Cameron, let's see what you're made of.

Why don't you scrap Sandwell and the Environment Agency and see if anybody notices?

Forge Mill Lake

The UK; Europe; the USA and sundry other countries are entering the third year of one of the most serious financial situations the world has seen.

Many of these countries have run up massive debts, and all have seen their national outputs decline to levels which have necessarily required cuts in national and local government expenditures.

The old fashioned term for this is living within your means.

So how is Sandwell MBC shouldering its responsibilities in these stringently demanding times?

Well it's doing what it does best - wasting money and destroying the environment at the same time.

My return from the summer recess was, I had hoped, going to be a routine picking up of the threads.

Sadly, this proved not to be the case as I found carnage being carried out in Sandwell Valley - but I will catalogue that in later posts because the Forge Mill Lake business vastly outstrips the scale of destruction in Sandwell Valley in both its scope and audacity.

Would you believe that at a time when most of the world is reeling from financial shockwaves, and taking Draconian measures just to try and stay afloat, Sandwell is spending money on encouraging ground nesting birds to inhabit an island.

Laughable isn't it!

At least it would be if it were not so stupid.

And, of course, the great bonus for Sandwell is 'the removal of all woody vegetation', and just to prove how much Sandwell is relishing this, they have the pictured machine to ensure maximum eradication with the minimum of effort - at a cost, of course.

I have many photos of the area concerned and will in due course post the usual before and after shots.

'This will provide a valuable and rare habitat....' trumpets the Sandwell notices.

Valuable?

I think 'expensive' or 'unnecessarily expensive' would better adjectives.

Rare?

How about 'bloody' or 'half baked'?

Dartmouth Park Restoration - IX

Hooray !!

The concrete steps are open !!!!

Well, half open anyway.

Or half closed.

More likely, Sandwell MBC don't know whether they are open or closed.

Maybe some senior Sandwellian thought (OK, unlikely, but give him the benefit of the doubt) while he was ruminating over his tea and ginger biscuits, that as the school summer holidays started yesterday (23rd July), some people who visited last year, might remember this year that they couldn't get from the car park to Darmouth park last year. And maybe this person had another thought, (phew!) that if the people who visited last year and this year realised that they still couldn't get from the car park into Dartmouth park, then these people might ask themselves what Sandwell had been doing for the last 12 months.

(A question which regulars ask themselves all the time. And not only 'what?' but more pertinently 'why?')

So, it's just possible that the senior Sandwellian felt sufficiently senior to authorise the opening of the gates to the concrete steps in order that the people who visited this year and last year would not realise that access to Dartmouth park from the car park had indeed been unavailable not just for a year, but nearer 15 months.

No need, he might have thought, for a full council meeting to approve this. But, just in case some of its more bellicose members should object, better to open only one of the gates and not both of them. This way it could be claimed that the concrete steps were merely 'on test' pending a full risk assessment by the Sandwell MBC Health and Safety Secretariat, while the necessary safety signs, such as 66 'Mind the Step' signs were being prepared. (That's 33 for each step up and 33 for each step down!)

You think I'm joking?

I'll have you know that the Sandwell MBC Health and Safety Secretariat take all things most seriously which might, however vaguely, impinge on the unsuspecting; untrained and unwary public.

Evidence?

A kiddies play area entitled 'Sandwell by the Sea' has been created in Sandwell Valley.

It contains a few inflatable slides; a hot dog stall; a sand pit and one or two other things. It's a bit of a swizz really because signs at the entrances to the area proclaim 'Entrance Free' but it's not until you are inside that you realise you have to pay for almost everything with money or tokens which cost 80p each.

Anyway, once again, I digress.

One of the attractions is a sizeable inflated oblong pool which contains a foot or so of water and 10 little boats for kiddies to float around in.

A sign at the entrance to this screams out 'Warning. Children may get wet'

Praise the Lord and all at the Sandwell MBC Health and Safety Secretariat.

If they didn't do this sign themselves, then their influence has certainly spread far and wide.